Félix Varela: A Latino Defender of Modern Philosophy without Neglecting his Faith*

By Vicente Medina

Few philosophers and scholars in the Anglophone world have heard of or have known about the Cuban presbyter/philosopher Félix Varela y Morales. Even those who might have come across his name in a 1997 postage stamp honoring him as part of the Great American Series collection are probably unaware of his contributions to our American culture, including his selfless commitment to helping mostly the newly arrived dispossessed members of the Irish community of New York during the nineteenth century. Varela—who crossed the Atlantic to escape from political oppression at home—engaged in a dialogue among expatriates and also among US writers and scholars, thereby contributing to the formation of an eclectic multiethnic culture.

Here, political exiles (like Varela) found a social milieu where they could freely express their iconoclastic political ideas, including criticizing and advocating against tyrannical regimes in the Americas without jeopardizing their lives or their freedom. In Varela’s case, he never went back to Cuba and died in St. Augustine, Florida, at the age of sixty-five in 1853.

Until recently, the intellectual and scholarly contributions of nineteenth century Latino/a political exiles who chose to live in the U.S. have been neglected. Fortunately, contemporary Latino/a scholars, such as Nicolás Kanellos, Rodrigo Lazo, and Carmen E. Lamas, have engaged in an excavation project of prominent Latina/o writers who resided in the nineteenth century U.S. Accordingly, their transatlantic voices have started to be heard, and justice is beginning to be done to their substantive contributions to our culture. As a Cuban priest, philosopher, and political activist in the U.S., Varela’s voice is prominent among them.

Félix Varela y Morales was born on November 20th, 1788, in Havana, Cuba. As his leading biographer, José Ignacio Rodriguez explains, he was a polymath, priest, philosopher, pedagogue, theologian, and an elected representative of Cuba to the Spanish Cortes in 1821 who initiated a profound philosophical and pedagogical reform in nineteenth century Cuba. Varela studied at the Royal and Conciliar College and Seminary of San Carlos and San Ambrosio of Havana (henceforth, San Carlos Seminary). In the same seminary, the Bishop of Havana, Juan José Días de Espada y Fernández de Landa, appointed Varela as a young professor, encouraging him to continue reforming the teaching of philosophy and natural sciences in the light of modern philosophy and science. By embracing the modern inductive method in science and eclecticism in philosophy, his teaching in the seminary contrasted with the teaching of late scholasticism and its outmoded appeal to authority, i.e., the controversial magister dixit, at the Royal and Pontifical University of St. Jerome of Havana.

In March 1820, King Ferdinand VII of Spain was forced to restore the Constitution of 1812—the same constitution that he abrogated in 1814. There was a call to reconvene the Spanish Cortes, and Varela was elected delegate in 1821 to represent Cuba in the Cortes. However, prior to his departure, Bishop Espada asked him to establish a course on constitutional law at the San Carlos Seminary. Since this was a challenging new course having no precedent in Cuba or Latin America, there was no textbook on this subject matter. Consequently, he was asked to promptly write a textbook for it: Observaciones sobre la constitución de la monarquía española. While this was  a liberal text defending the principles of natural rights and arguing against the ills of tyrannical governments, he did not yet embrace the practice of religious tolerance, which was part of the liberal creed in the Anglophone world. Nevertheless, at the Cortes, the philosopher/priest reluctantly turned politician defended liberal projects favoring Cuba’s autonomy, promoting the recognition of the independence of American colonies from Spain, and demanded the progressive abolition of the odious practice of slavery in Cuba.

Regrettably, the Cortes were disbanded and Varela, fearing for his life, chose to look for political asylum in New York. Once in the U.S., and disenchanted with Spain’s despotic monarch, he moved to Philadelphia where in 1824 published the first three volumes of the newspaper El Habanero: Papel Poliítico, Científico y Liiterario discussing new scientific and literary developments but also promoting Cuba’s independence from Spain. Meanwhile, back in New York, he continued publishing El Habanero and translated Thomas Jefferson’s Manual of Parliamentary Procedures with his own commentaries showing his commitment to the values of American republicanism.

As vicar general for the archdiocese of New York, he founded several journals among which are The Truth Teller (1825–1855), New York Catholic Diary (1835–1836), The Catholic Observer (1836–1837), The Catholic Expository and Literary Magazine (1841–1843), and The Catholic Expositor (1843–1844), to mention only a few.  In these publications, Varela wrote essays not only defending Catholic orthodoxy, but also philosophical essays, such as his Essay on the Doctrine of Kant, and Letter of an Italian about the doctrines of Félicité de Lamennais, an influential and controversial nineteenth century French priest and philosopher who abandoned the priesthood in opposition to the Pope. Varela argued against both. According to him, Kant’s transcendental philosophy led to epistemological skepticism and pantheism. Similarly, he contended that Lamennais’s appeal to the general consent of the majority as the only criterion of truth led him to implicitly accept pantheism, too.

Varela published several works that transformed the teaching of philosophy and natural sciences in Cuba. In 1812, he published the first two volumes in Latin of his Instituciones philosophiae eclecticae  [Lectures on Eclectic Philosophy], but, for the first time, in 1813–1814, he published the third and third volumes in Spanish. In this work, he embraced the eclectic method by choosing compelling arguments independently of their provenance, thereby avoiding the anachronistic magister dixit of late scholasticism. Also, his Elenco de 1816 [Notes of 1816], he continued his anti-authoritarian argument by contending that “the Patristic Fathers have no authority on philosophical matters, and we ought to focus only on the reasons that support such matters.” In the same work, he went even further, advocating for the first time that, like men, women should be instructed in the natural sciences.

Subsequently, in 1818, Varela published his magnus opus Lecciones de filosofía in three volumes. In part II of this work, he anticipated the contemporary global debate about removing monuments built to honor vicious ideas, including those celebrating former slaveholders and tyrants. He argued that “The people would have wished to destroy by fire the monuments and statues built to honor tyrants.” In 1819, he published his Miscelánea filosófica in Cuba continuing his defense of inductivism over the Aristotelian syllogistic method, including defending a pragmatic approach similar to the one found in William James’s Pragmatism (1907). Like the American Pragmatists, he contended that no one should bother with explanations of state of affairs whose possible truth or falsity might have no practical results. If that were to be the case, the issue in question would be idle or just a philosophical curiosity.

Later he published a second edition of his Miscelánea in Madrid 1821, and a third edition in New York 1827. He worked and published an expanded edition of his Lecciones de filosofía while residing in Philadelphia in 1824. His Lecciones, like his Miscelánea, were popular not only in Cuba but elsewhere in Latin America. That explains why he revised and updated them in a third edition in 1828, a fourth edition in 1832, and a fifth (and last edition) in 1841.

While residing in New York, he published his Cartas a Elpidio [Letters to Elpidio]: the first volume was published in New York in 1835, and the second volume was published in Madrid, Spain in 1836 (and in New York in 1838). These letters were addressed to the Cuban youth, but not only to them, because he dedicated his fifth letter to religious toleration. Given the prevalent intolerant sentiment of the Protestant majority at the time in New York, Varela’s letter defending religious toleration from a Catholic perspective was innovative and courageous. He expected that his Cartas were going to have a positive impact, especially among the Cuban youth, but, unfortunately, his expectations never materialized. So disheartened was Varela about the poor reception of his Cartas on the island that, while he had planned to write a third volume, he never managed to do so. Or, if he did, it has not been found.

Varela was one of the very few, if any, nineteenth century Latino philosophers who wrote in favor of religious toleration. He defended religious tolerance as a means to maintain social peace. He understood that without social peace the evangelical work of the Church was virtually impossible to carry out. His views on religious tolerance, nonetheless, evolved over time. While teaching in the San Carlos Seminary, in his Elenco de 1816 [Notas of 1816]  sec. 52, he wrote, “against advocates of religious tolerance we defend the view that not all religions are good because the Catholic religion is the only true one.” However, when he became a political exile in the US, he developed a broad liberal view of religious toleration. He admired the broad legal tolerance existing in the US to the extent that he wrote: “I do not believe that there is any other country in which this point is observed so strictly, and this is the basis of its peacefulness.”

Varela’s change of heart about religious toleration could be seen as a result of his personal experience and his pragmatic approach, be that in philosophy, science, or politics. He understood that serving those in need was of paramount importance for him; however, without social peace that was infeasible. As a political exile living in New York in 1838, he changed his previously intolerant view for a broad liberal view of religious toleration.

Of course, having experienced the religious diversity in New York where Protestants and Catholics maintained a somewhat peaceful but tense modus vivendi, Varela recognized the virtue of religious tolerance for maintaining and even fomenting a peaceful coexistence as stated above. And yet, he was well aware that, while religious toleration was legally recognized, their modus vivendi was precarious at best. This was the case because anti-Catholic sentiment among the Protestant majority was widespread resulting at times in mob violence, such as the one that burned down St. Mary’s Church in New York City in 1831.

Like Varela, Latino philosophers, such as the Venezuelan Andrés Bello and the Argentine Juan Bautista Alberdi, displayed a virtue that oftentimes has been ignored—namely, their pragmatic eclecticism. Rather than solely focusing on philosophical speculation for its own sake, they used their philosophical skills to try to improve their societies, be they as pedagogues, politicians, and/or diplomats.

Varela’s free spirit in philosophy, science, and politics can be a role model for public intellectuals. He opposed the authoritarian practice of the magister dixit. Also, he embraced modern science and philosophy to overcome social prejudices and superstitious beliefs in society. Moreover, he advocated against the despicable practice of slavery, while being a paladin for Cuba’s and Latin American nations’ independence from Spain. At a time when women were conceived of as being unfit for higher education, he courageously recommended that they, like men, be instructed in the natural sciences. He was an advocate against despotic and tyrannical regimes, thereby favoring a republican form of government.

Given the present wave of authoritarianism at home and abroad, we can certainly learn from Varela’s argument against the controversial magister dixit in philosophy and, most importantly, from his argument against tyranny in politics. And yet, we need not forget that his faith was a source of spiritual strength and a pole star for his philosophy. As a result, he was an admirable public philosopher without neglecting his faith.

*Published at Blog of the APA

PILOT SHOT DOWN BY CUBAN GOVERNMENT SHOULD BE MEMORIALIZED IN HIS NATIVE NORTH HUDSON

By Rolando Alum

I rush to complete my 14th and final Op-Ed for our Jersey Journal inasmuch as --regrettably-- it ceases publication next month. Allow let me to take this opportunity to honor the memory of Mario Manuel de la Peña (1971-1996), who was born at the old Weehawken’s North Hudson Hospital (now Palisades Medical Center in the nearby municipality of North Bergen).

We continuously hear about the downing of non-military aircraft by rogue bellicose countries. I particularly recall the monstrous shooting-down of a Korean passenger plane by the then Soviet Union in September 1983. But years later, and closer to home, we had the February 1996 downing by “Socialist” Cuba’s military airplanes of two U.S.-based, small civilian planes, one of which was piloted by our own Hudson native, Mario de la Peña.

Only 24 years young, Mario was a volunteer with the Florida-based “Brothers to the Rescue” [BTTR] organization that air-patrolled the Florida Straits searching for Cuban seafaring escapees. These pilots routinely alerted the U.S. Coast Guard so as to save refugees’ lives. Sometimes the pilots would also drop fliers with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights printed in Spanish, many of which --with favorable winds-- would fall on Cuban land, thus informing ordinary Cubans of such ideal rights deprived to them by their Marxist-oriented government.

On that Saturday afternoon of February 24, 1996 Cuban military aircraft shot down two BTTR planes, killing, aside from Mario, three other airmen. As the investigations by international organizations (e.g., the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights) concluded:

1--The BTTR planes were unarmed.

2--They were scandalously attacked in international airspace, far away from Cuba.

3--A third BTTR plane, whose pilots witnessed the criminal attacks, managed to return to

south Florida.

4--As duly reported, the Cuban state’s military aircrafts never implemented any warning or interception methods (such as a forced landing), as is the international protocol.

5--In fact, the U.S.-monitored recording of the verbal communications between the Communist Cuban pilots with their Havana superiors prove that orders were given to mercilessly “destroy the BTTR planes,” evocative of the Korean airliner’s Soviet attack recordings.

As we approach the 29th anniversary of Mario’s untimely death, and given that he resided as a child with his family in Union City and West New York, I herewith suggest to the elected Hudson County commissioners and the apropos municipalities’ officials to consider resolutions memorializing Mario’s legacy and even a street or corner naming with a corresponding plaque honoring the martyrdom of this idealistic humanitarian, freedom fighter Hudsonite.

*===BYLINE: Prof. Roland Armando Alum, a West New York (N.J.) resident for most of his life, is a retired Anthropology college professor and former State and Federal governments official, currently a University of Pittsburgh external research associate in Latin-American studies and vice-chair of the Trenton-based New Jersey Center for Hispanic Policy, Research & Development

The Continuing Relevance of Compadrazgo Spiritual Kinship in Latin America

By Roland Alum

Compadrazgo, from the gender-neutral gloss compadre in Spanish, literally means co-parenthood (i.e., shared parenthood). In its most elemental sense, the term refers to the spiritual and ritual kinship established between the parents and the godparents of a child over his/her baptism, which is the first of the seven Roman Catholic sacraments, an archetypal rite of passage. Common throughout Latin America, this sociocultural institution enmeshes biological and symbolic-religious parentages into a kin-like interpersonal relationship. It further evolved into an ever-expanding network of systemic “kinship by choice” characterized by a flow of highly respectful social and even reciprocal material responsibilities, especially among the adults involved.

The elaborate compadrazgo system has been studied mainly by sociocultural anthropologists, chiefly in Mesoamerica and the Andean region. Sir Edward Tylor, the pioneering British anthropologist, was an early commentator on Mexican ritual kinship, and twentieth-century ethnographers, such as the late Hugo Nutini (1928–2013), theorized the cultural phenomenon in the countries south of the Río Grande. Researchers have reported countless variations of religious, quasi-religious, and even secular compadrazgo occasions throughout the Americas. (Interestingly, it is not found in eminently Catholic societies, such as Ireland, and compadrazgo traditions in Spain and Portugal tend to be less intricate than their “New World” counterparts, yet it is prevalent in the Philippines, which was colonized by Spain).

For Anglo-Catholics, as well as the followers of other Christian rites that practice baptism —such as Anglicans and Episcopalians— the individuals involved in these ceremonies are not expected to form kin-like groups. However, in much of Ibero America, participants are typically drawn into a quasi-sacred relationship that at times supersedes even consanguineal and affinal relations. The terms “compadres” (masculine/neutral) and “comadres” (feminine) have become tantamount to “chums” or “buddies” —sometimes even “accomplices”— in everyday discourse throughout the region.

Despite the continued importance of compadrazgo among Latin Americans (as well as Hispanics in the United States), it seems that many contemporary anthropologists tend to either overlook the phenomenon or view it as a passé subject. This is somewhat ironic, given that compadrazgo traditions have proven to be both pliable and enduring. Here, I present some observations that connect contemporary practices with long-standing issues and discussions in the study of compadrazgo.

One form of change and variation that anthropologists might examine relates to who participates in compadrazgo. Both religious-based and secular types display vast geographic variation and are often subject to rather arbitrary local parishes and/or folk interpretations. The primordial baptism ceremony symbolizes a cleansing rebirth that marks a child’s initiation into the world’s Christian community. Technically, only one adult sponsor of either gender is required by Catholic Church rules, but customarily, both a man and a woman stand as godparents. Lately, I have observed among US Hispanics in my own community in northern New Jersey the addition of more than one duo as symbolic godparents at the ceremony.

Another set of changes and continuities has to do with the responsibilities that godparents have toward the neophyte and their compadres. In theory, the godparents are responsible for the child’s religious upbringing. Although there are no legal obligations, godparents are morally expected to raise the child in case of the parents’ absence. They are also usually expected to assume certain financial responsibilities for the godchild, as well as for the fiesta that normally follows the ceremony. I experienced these expectations myself upon standing recently as godfather to two Mexican siblings in a remote rural hamlet of the state of Puebla (see image of the baptism invitation below).

The relationship between the five individuals involved is characterized by an elaborate etiquette that includes expressions of deference, trust, and reciprocity of various kinds. This reverent conduct among the adult co-godparents encompasses addressing each other as “compadre” or “comadre,” respectively, while adopting the formal and more respectful usted form that replaces the informal tú in Spanish.

Although baptism co-godparenthood remains the classical form of compadrazgo, these types of ties grew exponentially to incorporate a large number of occasions throughout the region. Examples include other Catholic sacraments, such as first communion, confirmation, and matrimony, as well as nonreligious rites of passage, such as school graduations and quinceañeras, along with quasi-religious rituals that bless pets and other animals, as well as objects (e.g., a house, a tractor or an automobile). In the Mexican state of Tlaxcala alone, Hugo and Jean Nutini reported discovering over 30 occasions for compadrazgo.

At the same time, there seems to be much continuity when it comes to the functions of compadrazgo, which include, in some cases, the reinforcement of social hierarchies. The question of who is included in co-godparent bonds is subject to regional variation. In some areas, for example, all of the co-godparents of an individual may be considered mutually compadres, too, although it is understood that this is ultimately optional. A Mexican-born anthropology colleague reported to me that even the parents of her co-godparents treated her as an instant comadre. Yet the basic social functions remain, to wit:

(1) extending personal networks and family alliances,

(2) intensifying existing ties among consanguineal and affinal kin and friends,

(3) fostering harmony and social solidarity (e.g., mutual support in difficult times), and

(4) enhancing local prestige (more godparents means greater prestige, i.e., social capital).


Further, scholars have distinguished between horizontal and vertical forms of compadrazgo, the former involving co-godparents of a similar social level (e.g., class, ethnicity), and the latter referring to selection of co-godparents from a higher status. Compadrazgo among equals serves to bolster group solidarity, whereas vertical compadrazgo could establish and reinforce patron-client relationships. A case in point was dictator Rafael Trujillo in the Dominican Republic (1930–1961), who stood as godfather to hundreds of children baptized en masse, with him expecting political loyalty from the new ritual kinspeople. I met some of these individuals during my own field research there in the 1970s.

Although some researchers might have forecasted the demise of compadrazgo among Latin Americans due to economic development, secularization, internal and transnational migration, and the growing presence of Protestant and evangelical churches in the region, compadrazgo has endured and adapted to such changes. Instances of compadrazgo do not seem to be diminishing in ever-expanding Latin American cities or, for that matter, among Hispanics in the United States. Scholars have also found that compadrazgo ties often survive after conversions to Protestantism. Besides, even in the case of baptism, according to Catholic Church rules, only one godparent needs to be Catholic.

New communication technologies have also offered novel opportunities for the establishment and continuation of compadrazgo ties. Nowadays, an overseas-based couple might participate remotely as baptismal godparents at a ceremony taking place in, say, South America. At the church, there would stand proxy godparents —called padrinos de brazos (literally, “arm godparents”)— who ceremonially hold the neophyte in their arms for the ritual, though the emigrants’ names still appear in the baptism certificate as the rightful godparents. Resources could flow from the overseas padrinos to the new ritual kin, given that, again, there is an expectation of noblese oblige.

While some foreign anthropologists might tend to overlook compadrazgo, lately I have found that many Latin American anthropologists still give proper weight to its analysis. The two main characteristics of compadrazgo, its plasticity and its inconsistencies, have allowed the institution to meet the challenges of a dynamic and postmodern world. From a social-scientific standpoint, compadrazgo offers a unique opportunity to empirically study a “kinship by choice” tradition in a time of rapid social change.



===Roland Armando Alum: An AAA “Distinguished Member,” is an external Research Associate with the Center for Latin American Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, vice-chair of both the New Jersey Certified Psychoanalysts Advisory Committee and the N.J. Center for Hispanic Policy, Research & Development, as well as a trustee of DeVry University-NJ.

My tio's unlikely journey from communist Cuba to key figure in Apollo 11 moon landing

 His fascination for space travel began in Cuba and followed him into exile in New York and Florida. Heroes in this country come from all over.

By Rick Jervis

I didn’t know my tío, Miguel Hernandez, very well growing up.

He lived in Houston, Texas, which, for a Cuban American kid like me growing up in Miami, was as faraway and foreign as Anchorage or Reykjavik. I knew he was my mom’s first cousin and we called him “Chichi.” He would visit Miami at least once a year with his wife, Tere, and two sons, Michael and Jorge Luis, who were slightly older than me. We'd all play baseball or hit the pool together, then they were gone again.

To our family, though, Miguel was a living legend, someone who worked for NASA, lunched with astronauts and met presidents. It wasn’t until much later, however, that I discovered the depth of his role in helping U.S. astronauts reach the moon — and the unlikely path from Havana to Houston that got him there.


As we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing — which occurred 50 years ago Saturday — there will be films and forums and well-deserved praise of household names such as Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong. But a legion of engineers, mathematicians and the occasional Cuban immigrant also helped realize that Herculean feat.

“I never imagined I’d be involved in this type of work,” Miguel told me recently. “But I was always interested in it.”

An eye toward the stars

As a boy growing up in Cuba, he'd rifle through copies of Aviation Week & Space Technology, sparking an early interest in space travel. In 1959, shortly after Fidel Castro took hold of the island and began steering it into Soviet-style communism, a replica of the Soviet Sputnik I — the first satellite to orbit the Earth — arrived on a ship in Havana Harbor. Miguel, then 17, marveled at the polished metal orb with four antennae that could circle the Earth.


As Castro nationalized companies and seized homes, 19-year-old Miguel turned against the government, handing out anti-Castro pamphlets and denouncing the regime. When his activist friends began landing in prison, he fled Cuba, heading first to Miami and later to New York City to live with relatives. He had $100 in his pocket and knew no English. His aunt lent him a coat — two sizes too big — to survive the New York winters.


All it takes is a series of policies:Venezuela was my home, and socialism destroyed it. Slowly, it will destroy America, too.

He worked in the mailroom of American International Underwriters (now AIG) downtown and took English classes at night. But his mind often drifted skyward. On his spare time, he read of how Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space in April 1961, followed a few weeks later by American Alan Shepard. He attended the New York City ticker-tape parade for John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth. He marveled when, soon after, President John Kennedy promised that America would be the first to put a man on the moon.

"I said, 'These people are crazy,'" he said. 


When he had learned enough English, Miguel attended the University of Florida, graduating with a mechanical engineering degree. When NASA recruiters visited his campus in 1966, he jumped at the chance to work at the space agency. He was assigned to the newly-opened John F. Kennedy Space Center near Cape Canaveral, Florida, training astronauts for the nascent Apollo missions. Miguel and a team of other engineers were tasked with learning all the systems required to propel a man into space and teach them to the astronauts via simulators. His specialty: propulsion and rockets.

A dangerous project

Just a few weeks into his new job, tragedy struck. Miguel watched in horror from the control room as a cabin fire swept the Apollo 1 module during a test launch rehearsal, killing all three astronauts. “That had a terrible impact on everyone,” he said.

The missions continued and by 1969 buzz was mounting for the Apollo 11 moon landing. Miguel was swept up in the fervor. He and his team worked 24-hour shifts, double-checking systems and readying the astronauts to reach the moon. Mike Collins, the lesser known of the three Apollo 11 pilots, was the nicest, Miguel said, though all three — Collins, Aldrin and Armstrong — appreciated and absorbed the training.

50th anniversary:I worked on the Apollo 11 moon mission. Here's how a team of heroes achieved greatness.

"You needed to have the confidence of the astronauts," he said. "You couldn't at any moment tell them something that later turned out to be wrong. That could cost them their lives."


Miguel watched the moon landing like millions of others around the world: on a TV set in his living room with his family — and in complete awe. “It was an accomplishment for the whole world,” he said. “It was something not just that the United States did — it was something the human race did.”

Later that year, Miguel broadcast the Apollo 12 mission in Spanish for La Fabulosa WFAB radio station in Miami. He also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his role in the hair-raising rescue of the Apollo 13 mission in 1970, which was nearly stranded in space after an oxygen tank exploded, crippling a key system. In all, he would train astronauts for the Apollo 1, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15 and 17 missions, three Skylab space station flights and the first two Space Shuttle missions.

Perhaps his greatest achievement was a sizable puncture in the agency’s color barrier. At a time when racial tensions still flared in the U.S., and the civil rights movement was reaching its apex, Miguel was the only Latino in his department and the only one he knew of at NASA.


He said he never felt discriminated against; everyone was too focused on the missions to care about race or nationalities. Though I believe that’s true, I also think it couldn’t have always been easy being a Cuban émigré in the 1960s, working alongside hyper-intelligent colleagues who didn't look or talk like you and communicating in a language you learned just a few years earlier.

None of that got in his way, of course.
The next generation's frontier

Miguel left NASA in the 1980s and parlayed his unique skill set and experience into a successful business, Hernandez Engineering, that contracted with the space agency for decades. Today, 77 and retired, he travels the world with his wife and enjoys frequent visits from his sons and five grandchildren.


As luck has it, I now live in Austin, a two-hour drive from Houston. I’ve taken my wife and two daughters to visit Miguel at his home in the Houston suburb of Seabrook and at his ranch near College Station. I’ve relished watching him joke with my daughters or cook them dinner or helping them clear brush on his ranch.


My eldest daughter, Elle, 8, recently acquired a tireless fascination with outer space and astronauts and hopes to be the first human on Mars. Miguel has promised her special access to NASA training facilities and introductions to astronauts next time we’re in town, a prospect that makes Elle giggle with delight.

One day, spinning gently in zero gravity in the International Space Station, she’ll peer out a window and look down at Earth and think of those who blazed her trail to the stars.

Rick Jervis is the Austin-based correspondent for USA TODAY. Follow him on Twitter: @MrRJervis.

Oswaldo Payá: "“I am not going to leave. It is Fidel who must leave.”

INTERVIEW TO DAVID E HOFFMAN BY VICENTE MORIN AGUADO 

By Vicente Morín Aguado.

I met David E. Hoffman* at the splendid Books & Books, Coral Gables, Florida, during the presentation of his recent biography on Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, emblematic Cuban opponent, Sakharov Prize for Human Rights of the European Parliament, Catholic and promoter of non-violence, who died in the dark and still not clarified circumstances on July 22, 2012, as a result of a car accident.

Exploring the Nashville environment, as a newly arrived Cuban, I discovered another great book store, Barnes & Noble, part of picturesque Hendersonville, and the face of the Cuban martyr reappeared, motivating the following question that the biographer answered:

Carlos Alberto Montaner, perhaps the most widely read in the Spanish language of Cuban journalist has written: “The acts that a liberal classifies in Russia as political crimes, he ignores when they occur in Cuba”. Considering that you have written, and with remarkable success, on the Russian-Soviet subject, do you also suffer this kind of disappointment? 

I think what Carlos Alberto is saying is that when a government anywhere denies people basic rights—to free speech, belief, assembly, press and free enterprise—we should be equally concerned. The lack of rights cannot be ignored in Cuba any more than in Russia or China. Do you know that the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights was written with the help of prominent Cubans, including the jurist Gustavo Gutiérrez, whose thinking about freedom and democracy informed the drafting process? The word “universal” meant that it would apply to all, and we should not forget that in today’s world. No country can simply check out.

This biography has the merit of addressing, between literature, testimony and the historical chronicle, a synthesis of the last 120 years. What did you learn about our past?

What I learned is that, since 1902, there have been waves of Cubans who struggled to establish democracy, clean government, independence and prosperity. They tried but didn’t always succeed. Take a look back at Gutiérrez’s generation, who came of age in the 1920s. They were discouraged by what they saw after two decades of statehood.

There were a series of rebellions – remember the Minoristas and the Veterans and Patriots. This generation was further discouraged by the Machado dictatorship. They discovered a new the visions of Jose Martí, in part through Jorge Mañach’s book, “Martí: Apostle of Freedom.” By 1940, Cubans had come together to write a new Constitution that was the most democratic (and long-winded) in their history. It was followed by 12 years of constitutional transfer of power, although the scourge of corruption lingered, some semblance of democracy existed. The 1940 Constitution contained a small but essential provision allowing for a citizen initiative—for the people to take charge and ask for laws. This provision amazingly remained during Fidel Castro’s revolution. And when Oswaldo Payá began to advance the Varela Project in the late 1990s, it was this provision that allowed him to seek signatures for a citizen initiative. So yes—the waves of change are connected. Unfortunately, there were also waves of repression and falling backwards.

Ignoring sales statistics, personally, tell at least one pleasant and an unpleasant anecdote about the reception of your book.

One of the most pleasant aspects of the reception was our event at Books & Books in Coral Gables, with the Payá family present, and also the Gutiérrez family, and many other people familiar with the story. The most unpleasant by far is the simple fact that Oswaldo Payá is not with us, and he must rely on me and his friends and family to tell the story.

To what extent were the authorities in Cuba hostile with regard to investigating the life of a notorious political opponent like Oswaldo Payá?

The authorities in Cuba have never conducted a thorough investigation into Oswaldo Payá’s death. They charged the driver of the car, Ángel Carromero, with homicide, and put him on trial, and convicted him. But Carromero later said he was forced to give a false confession. At no time did the authorities in Cuba admit that the car carrying Oswaldo Payá was rammed from behind by state security. I hope they will agree to conduct a real investigation and release the autopsy report to the Payá family. That would be a start.

Did you try to go to Cuba as part of your investigation?

Yes, I went to Cuba. I walked the streets where Oswaldo Payá lived and worked. I devoted time to archival research, much of it outside the island. Please look at the endnotes to see the sources. Some of the records of the 1940 constituent assembly are still not public and I was not able to see them (although I asked) but the transcripts of the floor debate are open, and online. I used the extensive literature about the Cuba Republic, and the transcripts of Fidel. Most of the people necessary to interview for the book — those who knew Payá and worked with him — are no longer in Cuba, so I found them elsewhere, including the United States, Spain, Sweden and Germany.

To this day, do you think that your American compatriots understand the drama of the Cuban people?

Yes, I do, and I think the story of Cuba runs deep through the fabric of life in the United States. The story of the revolution and its failings is widely known and, as a reminder, about 300,000 Cubans fled the island over a year’s time. Their flight to exile says a lot about conditions in Cuba, and in the United States, it is impossible to ignore this sad and enduring catastrophe. Those people didn’t take chances on rafts or overland because they were happy and prosperous in Cuba. On their faces today is written the tragic drama of the economic and political failures of the revolution.

Do you can comment on the reception of your book among American politicians? Some important names that can be mentioned.

I really do not like to boast. Oswaldo Payá was not always well understood by politicians in the United States, especially in the exile community, but I think he is better understood now in the US, and his legacy and ideals are highly regarded.

I appreciate your modesty, but may be without mentioning names, I would like to know if there is evidence that this biography is known in the American political sphere.

Well, the book was featured at a number of events in Washington and Miami, including the Cuban Heritage Collection, the National Endowment for Democracy, and excerpts were published in The Washington Post. Honestly, it is hard for me to judge the impact—but I do think Oswaldo Payá is better known and understood in the United States than he was in 2003.

According to your long experience as a journalist, what sensitive aspects could help Cuban journalists opposed to the ruling regime in Cuba, to gain support and sensitivity in U.S. society.

Look, there is no secret to journalism. You ask questions and try to find out what happened. In an open society this is a daily routine, rather like the first coffee of the morning. But in closed societies like Cuba, such questions are prohibited. Why? What is the regime afraid of? So it is harder in a closed environment to ask questions, but journalism is not a crime. Reporting is not treason. But in a dictatorship, it takes a great deal of courage to be a journalist. More power to those who try against the odds.

The historical figure you biographed, is part of a list of political leaders whose preaching and personal nonviolent action, however, led them to be victims of murder. I'm thinking on Luther King or Mahatma Ghandi; is Payá one more of this tragic list?

Sadly, yes. But it is more important to focus on his life, and there you will see he is also a historic figure. I often say he is like Andrei Sakharov, who challenged the totalitarian Soviet state. Sakharov saw the flaws in the Soviet system, and eventually decided to stand up to them. Oswaldo Payá had the same sense of determination, the same moral compass, the same commitment to basic human rights.

Some lesson derived from Paya's life could be a compass for those who formulate policy towards Cuba?

Oswaldo Payá challenged Fidel from within. Once, during the Mariel boatlift, his relatives came and offered to bring him back to Florida. Way back then, Oswaldo said, “I am not going to leave. It is Fidel who must leave.” His point was that change has to come from within in order to be sustainable and legitimate. The 11J protests were a good example of change from within. The future of Cuba is not going to be decided by the United States, nor in the United States. Those who formulate policy toward Cuba should do everything they can that the desire for change from within is taking Cuba to a better future. This means enabling those forces for change.

What can you say to English-speaking people, especially from North America, as a recommendation for them to read Give me Liberty, The true story of Oswaldo Payá and his daring quest for a free Cuba?

Right now, the world seems to be awash in dictatorships. Look at China, Russia, Belarus, Burma. Look at the lack of freedoms even in places like Turkey, Egypt, Cambodia. The rollback of democracy is deeply concerning. The story of Oswaldo Payá is about one man’s effort to cause change in the other direction—to establish rights and democratic governance where there is now a dictatorship. Oswaldo Payá had the inspiration, stamina and vision to carry out this campaign, and I think it is profoundly inspiring, especially at this dark hour in which totalitarianism is returning to the globe.

*David E. Hoffman, journalist, born Palo Alto, CA. 1953. He won three National Journalism Awards during a decade of coverage for The Washington Post from the White House, Reagan administration, and the early days of George Bush Sr. Then he held the head of the Moscow office of such an important American medium for 6 years. His books reflect it this way:

- The Oligarchs: Wealth and Power in the New Russia. (PublicAffairs, 2002), ISBN 978-1-58648-001-1.

-The Dead Hand: The Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and its Dangerous Legacy (Doubleday, 2009), ISBN 978-0-385-52437-7 (Premio Pulitzer de 2010).

-The Billion Dollar Spy: A True Story of Cold War Espionage and Betrayal, Nueva York, Doubleday, 2015, ISBN 978-0385537605.

His fourth book motivates the following interview: Give me Liberty, The true story of Oswaldo Payá and his daring quest for a free Cuba. (Simon & Schuster, 2022)

 

 

 

Ragtime's Missing Links

Classical pianist Donna Coleman traces the legacy of Saumell, Gottschalk, and Cervantes and establishes a direct link to Scott Joplin's ragtime music!

An event sponsored by the Cuban Cultural Center of New York:

IN MEMORIAM Álvaro Ínsua (1935–2019)

By Roland Armando Alum

Álvaro Ínsua, born February 15, 1935, died in Miami, Florida, nearing his 84th birthday on January 13, 2019.

Ínsua’s historical connection to anthropology was his association with famed anthropologist Oscar Lewis and wife Ruth in the ill-fated “Project Cuba.” With the approval of the United States and Cuban governments, Lewis went to socialist Cuba in 1969–1970 to test a “corollary” of his controversial “culture of poverty” theory. Lewis had developed the culture of poverty idea through ethnographic research among Mexicans and Puerto Ricans, and hypothesized further that it could not exist in communist societies because the conditions engendering it would be absent in socialist economies.

Lewis met Ínsua at the Cuban Academy of Science, where Ínsua was a statistician, a subject he taught at the University of Havana. Considering themselves anthropology aficionados, Ínsua and wife Greta developed a close social relationship with Lewis, becoming de facto informants; Lewis also incorporated Greta into his research staff. Unfortunately, as well-documented later, the Castro brothers’ regime continuously spied on the Lewises through electronics, household staff, and the Communist Youth’s field assistants assigned to the project. When it appeared that the data gathered through Lewis’s typical collection of oral life histories was revealing the existence of a culture of poverty, not as a survivor of the pre-Castro era, but a post-1959 development, the regime abruptly cancelled the project. Much of the research material and imported equipment were confiscated, and the Lewises were expelled. Even Raúl Castro publicly accused Lewis later of being “a US spy.” Worse, Ínsua suffered six long years of imprisonment for his involvement; Greta, albeit harassed, was spared jail, as she reminded me recently. Lewis (1914–1970) died soon after returning to the United States.

In 1978 Ínsua, already out of prison, contacted me through third parties while I was completing my field research (for the University of Pittsburgh) in rural Dominican Republic. After obtaining exit visas, the Ínsua family was allowed to go into exile, coinciding in Miami with the arrival of the Mariel “Freedom Flotilla” refugees, among whom Ínsua still collected some life histories. Soon thereafter, the Ínsuas took an arduous bus ride to New Jersey, where I welcomed them; here, Ínsua worked for a bank. In 1985 he became the lead reporter in Miami for the federal government-sponsored Radio Martí Spanish-language broadcasting, retiring three decades later.

Of relatively humble origins, Ínsua had taken odd jobs earlier in life, especially while residing in New York during the authoritarian dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in the 1950s. Upon returning to Cuba, he tried his luck at acting, while studying statistics.

Ínsua is survived by his wife of 63 years, and their son, grandson, great-granddaughter, and great-great-grandson. There are several writings about the Lewises’ Cuban mishap, but few dwell on Ínsua; those interested in his case may begin with the latest articles, for example: Waldo Acebo Meireles’s (2020) six-part “Historia del Proyecto Cuba”; Lillian Guerra’s (2015) “Former Slum Dwellers, Communist Youth and the Lewis Project in Cuba”; and my own (2015) “The Cuban Culture of Poverty Conundrum”.

Emeritus Professor Authors Book on Famed Cuban Poets

(Submitted by Michael Kinane, Public and Media Relations)

The Academy of Cuban History in Exile recently published "Agustín Acosta and Oscar Fernández de la Vega - Two exemplary Cubans: Poetry, Teaching and Duty," by Dr. Jesse Fernández, distinguished teaching professor emeritus of SUNY Old Westbury. The volume brings together a study of the historical development of the prominent 20th century Cuban intellectuals mentioned in the title of the book. Acosta is considered one of the major poets in Cuban history, and was also a political leader in the 1930’s whose opposition to the totalitarian regime at that time landed him in prison and almost cost him his life. Fernández de la Vega, a close friend and admirer of Acosta, was a distinguished educator and scholar whose opposition to the Castro regime forced him to leave Cuba in 1960, at the peak of his career. The Academy of Cuban History in Exile is a not-for-profit organization in the United States that develops and documents records of historical facts related to Cuba and those exiled from the now-Communist nation.

WHY CUBA MATTERS, A NEW BOOK BY ONE OF OUR MEMBERS

Why Cuba Matters: New Threats in America’s Backyards, by Néstor T. Carbonell, was recently published by Archway Publishing.  Its author was born and raised in Havana, Cuba.  He comes from a prominent Cuban family that lefts its imprints on the island’s wars of independence and on the foundation and development of the republic.  He earned law degrees from the University of Villanueva in Havana and Harvard.  Forced into exile in June 1960, he played an important role in the anti-Castro movement’s resistance and diplomatic fronts.  He joined PepsiCo in 1967 as counsel, retiring in 2008 as a corporate vice president in charge of international government and public affairs.  He is a member and the Council on Foreign Relations and was recently elected as an academician by Academia de la Historia de Cuba en el Exilio, Corp.  He is also the author of several books, among them And the Russians Stayed: The Sovietization of Cuba and Los grandes debates de la constituyente cubana de 1940.

In this book, as an eyewitness to Fidel Castro’s rise to power in Cuba and other key episodes, Dr. Carbonell sheds new light on how the ruler and his allies deceived and subjugated Cuban people and defied twelve U.S. presidents.

The author draws on declassified documents and reliable unpublished testimonies, as well as personal experiences, to delve into the Communist takeover of Cuba, which he denounced while on the island.  He ponders the causes and consequences of the botched Bay of Pigs operation, which he joined as a refugee.

From the battle to expel the Castro regime from the Organization of American states, which Carbonell helped to achieve, to the Congressional Joint Resolution on Cuba, which he tenaciously pursued; from the looming Missile Crises, which the author persistently flagged, to the myriad subversive activities he warned against and condemned, Néstor T. Carbonell debunks the myths and fallacies surrounding the longest-running subversive tyranny in modern times.

For more information or to buy this book, click here:

 

My Repeating Island

By Gustavo Pérez Firmat

De las islas no se despide nadie para siempre.

                   Dulce María Loynaz

What sort of an exile is someone who has spent four-fifths of his life in another country and who has no intention of returning to Cuba to live no matter what the political conditions on the island? In exile he grew up and grew old. In exile he acquired a language, met all of his friends, married, had children, pursued a career, endured illnesses and separations. He’s certain that he will die in exile. He’s just as certain that he will die an exile. What sort of exile is this person, whose homeland is no longer his home? 

                                                            •

In the movie The Lost City, Andy García’s character, Fico Fellove, declares: “I’m only impersonating an exile. I’m still in Cuba.” When Fico says this, he has just arrived in New York City from Havana. I wonder what Fico would say were he still in New York forty years later. Perhaps he would say this: “I’m only impersonating a Cuban. I’ve always been in exile.” Time turns exile into a chronic condition, in the literal sense of the adjective: a way of being in the world inseparable from the experience of temporality. The chronic exile never says, I am an exiled Cuban. He always says, I am a Cuban exile: the noun, the substantive, is exile.

                                                            •

It is often thought that an exile spends his (or her) time in remembrance, but for the chronic exile, it’s not quite true. Even when he was young and still had relatives who, unlike him, had spent most of their lives in Cuba, he was not the source of memories but the one who received them, and later, the one who relayed them. He was the executor of the nostalgia of others: his parents and grandparents, his aunts and uncles, all those members of his typically distended family that included people whom he barely knew. His own memories of Cuba, such as they were, seemed less urgent, less necessary, than those of the grown-ups around him. It still seems that way, even now that he is the only grown-up around him.

                                                            •

When the chronic exile longs, he longs for a time when the people around him still had memories. He longs for the days of temporary, rather than chronic, exile. Virgil Suárez, one of the chronic exile’s heroes, writes in a poem: “How far do your roots extend? Far enough to do damage.” That is, not far enough.

                                                            •

Years ago a Miami newspaper carried a item about a man who had been paralyzed as a result of a stroke. He would spend his days in a wheelchair by the window of his Miami Beach condominium, facing south, mumbling to himself the only word he was still able to pronounce: Cuba. The chronic exile believes that he is like that man. Rather than recollection, his exile involves iteration: Cuba, Cuba, Cuba. What is this Cuba that he iterates? What are the modes of his iteration?

                                                            •

Three ways of thinking about Cuba: as país, as pueblo, and as patria. Not living among Cubans (el pueblo), and not having gone back to Cuba (el país), the chronic exile thinks of Cuba as his patria, a personal possession, an imaginary homeland, a country he cannot leave or lose. This Cuba goes with him wherever he goes. It dreams with him. It wakes up with him. It gets sick with him. It will die with him.

To the three ways of thinking about Cuba correspond the three faces of Cubanness: cubanidad, cubaneo, and cubanía. Cubanidad, a word that goes back to the first stirrings of a Cuban national consciousness at the beginning of the nineteenth century, designates a civil status embodied in birth certificates, passports, naturalization papers. By contrast, cubaneo isn’t borne out in documents or decrees, but in a loose repertoire of gestures, manners, customs, words. Rather than naming un estado civil, cubaneo names un estado de ánimo – a mood, a temperament, structures of thought and feeling: what used to be called “national character.” Its frame of reference is not un país – a political entity – but un pueblo  –  a  social and cultural entity.

The third face of Cubanness is cubanía, one of those rare words that actually has a birthday, since it was coined by Fernando Ortiz in a lecture at the University of Havana on November 28, 1939. Cubanía is not accident of birth, or a menu of manners and mannerisms. According to Ortiz, cubanía inheres in “la conciencia de ser cubano y la voluntad de quererlo ser.” Unlike cubanidad, which requires external verification, cubanía demands an act of the will. Unlike cubaneo, which requires the society of like-minded people, cubanía requires only a willingness of the heart. It does not find expression in a nation – un país – or in a people – un pueblo  –  but in something more abstract and ineffable – in a homeland, una patria.

Cubanía doesn’t depend on place of residence or country of citizenship; it has little to do with language or demeanor; and, perhaps most importantly, it cannot be granted or taken away. It is the expression of Cubanness most available to those of us for whom Cuba itself remains an unachievable blend of ser and querer ser, a redemptive form of wishful thinking. If cubanidad is political and cubaneo is prepolitical, cubanía perhaps should be described as postpolitical, as the nationality of those without a nation.

Touched by cubanía, the chronic exile no longer feels like a stranger in his own skin.

                                                            •

Iteration begins with memory fatigue. Like seeing childhood friends too often, after a while – years, decades – repeating the same stories over and over becomes unpleasurable. Worse: it becomes unpainful. The memories have lost their sting as well as their savor. Like a muse-less museum, or a house with closets but no skeletons.   

                                                            •

Or iteration begins with memory loss, which is what happened to the paralyzed man. Unable to remember Cuba, he could only utter “Cuba.” After the memories fade, what remains is the impulse to address, to point and name. Iteration is deictic, directional. Looking south, the man in the wheelchair could not see the island from where he sat, but his head was turned that way, one could say he was headed that way, though he would never reach the place toward which he was headed. This turning toward Cuba, as distinct from returning to Cuba, is the chronic exile’s mode of iteration. An invalid’s apostrophe.

                                                            •

In the 1930s Xavier Cugat recorded “Miami Beach Rhumba,” a song about a young woman who, on the way to Cuba to learn how to rhumba, found what she was looking for in Miami Beach:

I started out to go to Cuba, soon I was at Miami Beach.

There, not so very far from Cuba, oh what a rhumba they teach.

Palm trees are whispering “yo te quiero,” what could I do but stay a while?

I met a Cuban caballero, we danced in true Latin style.

So I never got to Cuba, but I got all its atmosphere.

Why even Yuba and his tuba, they played a night right here.

Like the girl in the song, the chronic exile makes do with atmosphere. Almost anything can create it: a riff, a whiff, a word, a gesture, a smoke. Atmosphere cannot be seen but it can be felt. Rather than a sense of place, the chronic exile is trailed by atmosphere. He feels it around and inside him. He exhales it and he inhales it. For him, a Cuban atmosphere is both landscape and inscape, environment and in‑vironment. Those he meets often think that he is the atmosphere, a Cuban caballero or a whispering palm tree. But he knows better: the atmosphere others see in him is not the atmosphere in which he dwells, perceptible only to him. A locale without a location, with contours rather than coordinates, this rarefied air he breathes is his portable island.

                                                            •

Atmosphere is feeling, affect – or rather, a particular affect. If exoticism, according to Victor Segalen’s classic definition, is the feeling that diversity stirs in us, the chronic exile’s atmosphere is the feeling stirred in him by something as familiar as his own first name, but also something that has been lost, like his own first name. We move through the familiar as through a vacuum. Only when the familiar becomes estranged from the everyday does it precipitate into atmosphere.         

                                                            •

Since tourism is touring, turning, some may think of atmospheric Cubanness as virtual tourism, a mental and sentimental retour au pays natal accomplished by traveling in place, without ever moving from the house from which the chronic exile gazes at his homeland. But whereas the tourist seeks the unknown, the unfamiliar, the chronic exile worships sameness: Cuba, Cuba, Cuba. The tourist comes and goes, while the chronic exile, having left once, has decided not to leave again.  

                                                            •

Nonetheless, he knows that he has become some sort of tourist, an occasional Cuban, sporadic rather than diasporic. In the almost fifty years that he has spent in exile, there have been many days when he has not heard a word of Spanish, but none when he has not heard a word of English. This is one reason, among others, why the chronic exile talks to himself – in Spanish.

                                                            •

Cuban graffiti: Havana, during the balsero exodus of the 1990s: “Yo me quedo”; Miami, at about the same time: “Yo no voy.” The chronic exile dissents from both sentiments. He cannot leave because he already left. He cannot stay because he never left. Were he to indulge in graffiti, he would scrawl on the walls of his house: “Yo aquí, allá ellos.”  

                                                            •

In the 1950s, Cuban children used to learn geography from a textbook by Leví Marrero, Geografía de Cuba, whose first illustration showed a map of the world with Cuba at its center. Its caption: “El mundo alrededor de Cuba.” Anyone familiar with Cubans will recognize that the belief that the world revolves around Cuba is more than a cartographic projection. It’s one of countless examples of the ombliguismo that scholars and pundits have discussed (and of which these pages may be another instance). A line from a song by the Cuban-American singer Willie Chirino sums up Cuban exceptionalism in four words: Como Cuba, ni Cuba. Like Cuba, not even Cuba. If islands are exceptions to the rule of continents, Cuba is an exception to an exception, an incontinent rule unto itself.

The second illustration in Geografía de Cuba offers another map of Cuba, but this time the perspective is different. The caption reads: “Cuba vista desde el norte.” In Cuban slang “el norte” is the United States. For the last half-century, “Cuba seen from the North” has encompassed the gaze of hundreds of thousands of Cubans. Looking at this map, the chronic exile sees himself looking at his homeland, that is, navel-gazing.

•

The poet Orlando González Esteva, another of the chronic exile’s heroes, likes to say, “El futuro ya pasó,” by which he means both “the future already happened” and “the future passed us by.” The reason, González Esteva adds, is not that we are no longer who we were, but that we have already been who we were going to be.

                                                            •

The chronic exile knows that, whatever happens in Cuba, it will have happened too late. Change may come to Cuba – it may have already – but no change will come to him. In this he resembles those hundreds of thousands of other exiles, on both sides of the Florida Straits and also within them, who did not live to see the day of their country’s liberation. Exile ends, chronic exile goes on.

                                                            •

But. Sin embargo.

                                                            •

But perhaps he is needlessly betting against himself. But perhaps his bitterness has misled him, making him believe that there are no third acts in an exile’s life. Eduardo Galeano, not one of the chronic exile’s heroes, once wrote that nostalgia is good but hope is better. It may be that when our day finally does come – it may have happened already – the cocoon of exile will fall away from him like dead skin. It may be that he will discover that he has not lost the ability to connect and commune. Hope – esperanza – is a word that he that has seldom used, an emotion that he has never embraced. When he was younger, he used to toast to a next year in Cuba without really believing it. The toast was an obligatory formality, one of the rituals of exile. More given to regret than to expectation, he always enjoyed living in the land of what-might-have-been, his only país. Will he allow himself to give up what might have been for what could be?

                                                            •

He tells himself that it would be a relief not to have to explain what kind of Cuban he is, which side he is on: for or against, gusano or revolucionario. He fantasizes about the day when he can identify himself as Cuban without his interlocutors wondering, usually silently, what he means. (His worm’s eye views never have been a secret.) Like others before him, he visualizes un puente, un gran puente spanning the distance between the aquí and the allá. Not a bridge to Cuba, but a bridge between Cubans. Were that day to come, he would scrawl new graffiti on his wall, no longer a wall: yo aquí, pero con ellos; allá ellos, pero conmigo.